1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a battery, in which a circuit board disposed on a battery cell is continuously covered by a molded resin portion, and a method for manufacturing the battery.
Priority is claimed on Japanese Patent Application No. 2003-89905, filed Mar. 28, 2003, the content of which is incorporated herein by reference.
2. Description of Related Art
A conventional battery that is mounted in a portable mobile terminal device such as personal telephone or personal digital assistants (PDA) includes a battery cell, a circuit board, which electronic components for controlling battery recharging and electrical protection are mounted on, connecting members for electrically connecting terminals of the battery to the circuit board, and a connector for connecting to the mobile terminal device, as is shown, for example, in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application, First Publication No. 2002-260615. In recent years, there is a demand for smaller batteries to allow further miniaturization of mobile terminal devices.
Accordingly, recently there has been produced a battery in which a molded resin portion continuously secures the battery cell, the circuit board, the connecting members and the connector; the battery being miniaturized by reducing the size of the molded resin portion.
That is, a circuit board is disposed on a narrow side face of a thin rectangular battery cell, and the connecting members are disposed on the side face and on narrow side faces adjacent thereto. A connector having the same width as the circuit board is secured on the top face of the circuit board. Consequently, the sections for forming the molded resin portion are restricted to the side and end faces of the battery cell, enabling the battery to be made smaller.
However, the conventional battery described above has a drawback in that, since the molded resin portions are formed separately on either side of the connector, resin must be poured separately into each region when forming the molded resin portions, making the manufacturing efficiency of the battery poor.
Furthermore, since the regions (cavities) where the molded resin portions are formed are defined by a metal mold and the connector, when the resin that was poured into the cavities from resin pouring grooves has reached the connector, it is apprehended that the resin may stick to the top face of the connector, i.e. to the external connecting terminal.
Resin sticking to the external connecting terminal may cause poor electrical contact between the external connecting terminal and the mobile terminal device, and for this reason the resin must be removed after the molded resin portion has been formed; this further reduces the manufacturing efficiency of the battery.
This invention has been realized after consideration of the circumstances above, and aims to provide a battery with increased manufacturing efficiency and a method for manufacturing the battery.